Horn Book (Sun Apr 01 00:00:00 CST 1990)

Dazzling, solid colors, sturdy black-outlined figures and objects, and a minimum of short, simple words tell the story of a group of six female and male paleontologists searching for dinosaur bones. The findings are wrapped, loaded, and trucked to a natural history museum where they are reassembled into a towering tyrannosaurus rex skeleton. Accurate, timely, and appropriate for the youngest dinosaur fan.

Publishers Weekly (Fri Oct 06 00:00:00 CDT 2023)

Once again, the author of Dinosaurs, Dinosaurs ; Trucks ; Boats and other picture books proves himself a master of simplicity. Here, a spare, rhythmic text (Bones. Bones. We look for bones.'') and vibrant, childlike pictures focus on six young paleontologists at work. They diligently dig up the dinosaur bones, wrap and pack them, load them on trucks and bring them to the natural history museum. There the bones are dusted off, and the skeleton of a Tyrannosaurus rex is reassembled, bone by bone. Finally, the painstaking job is completed, and the six workers set out in search of more bones. Barton makes a complex procedure easily comprehensible to the very youngest readers--and listeners. Children who have looked at dinosaur skeletons in museums and askedHow did it get here?'' now have a concise, entertaining answer. Ages 3-6. (Sept.)

School Library Journal

As in I Want to Be an Astronaut (Crowell, 1988), Barton takes a complex profession and makes it comprehensible to the very young. This time he captures the essence of the paleontologist's work: Bones. Bones. We look for bones,'' andWe look for the bones of dinosaurs.'' Six stoic scientists of both genders and varied race are depicted digging, wrapping, packing, loading , and assembling their finds. The illustrations are painted in bold primary colors on green, blue, and yellow backdrops; don't let children miss out on the last spread, in which nine dinosaurs are found, with labels that include pronunciations. A fine companion volume to Barton's Dinosaurs, Dinosaurs (Crowell, 1989). --Denia Lewis Hester, Dewey School, Evanston, IL